


Worlds within Worlds

by Rubynye



Category: Lord of the Rings - Tolkien
Genre: Interspecies, M/M, Size Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-13
Updated: 2010-01-13
Packaged: 2017-10-06 06:21:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/pseuds/Rubynye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Halbarad loves the Shire and its people.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worlds within Worlds

**Author's Note:**

> This ficlet is not really a proper anything; it started out as a droubble, and grew. I wrote it for [](http://claudia603.livejournal.com/profile)[**claudia603**](http://claudia603.livejournal.com/), who has brought us all a new appreciation of Halbarad. :D

Title: Worlds within Worlds  
Pairing: Halbarad/easily guessed surprise  
Rating: PG-13  
Warning: slash, interspecies  
Disclaimer: These characters and their setting do not belong to me.

The Shire is a fair and lovely little land, Halbarad finds himself often thinking, not least on this misty morning below autumn-dappled trees. It lacks the craggy, ruined majesty of lost Arnor, and nothing in it shines as high and fine as Gondor's proud White City, but it is a comfortable, thickly settled place of little farms and cots, townlets and people, all tending towards the round rather than the edged, the easy rather than the lean.

It is Halbarad's work to keep it so.

It is work, but it is also joy, and it is not unrewarded. One such boon, wrapped in sleep and Halbarad's cloak, shifts his dark head on Halbarad's thigh. His eyes are closed, lashes long over tender rosy cheeks, but Halbarad remembers them well, large and blue as the sky of a summer's night, sparkling like summer stars. Some of the Dunedain view the halflings as children, but Halbarad knows better; they are made in much the same pattern as Men but smaller, often plump, often beautiful as this one is, smiling in his sleep when Halbarad strokes silky-damp curls off his smooth brow. And last night, naked and gasping and perfect between his hands... Halbarad allows himself one moment to luxuriate in memory, then strokes again, a little harder. "Wake," he says gently, "You must wake."

"What, so soon?" Smiling, he opens his blue eyes, the golden flecks shining in the morning light, before he rubs them with his knuckles and groans. "It's morning! I never went home last night! And I hardly slept!"

"That was your doing as much as mine," Halbarad reminds him, almost laughing at the look of outrage thus evoked, helplessly joining in the following laughter. "Well," he says, lithely wriggling free of Halbarad's cloak and climbing up, hands pale against Halbarad's dark leathers, waist narrow and warm to hold, "how might I resist you?" The kiss is sweet, and as ever surprisingly encompassing from so small a mouth, but he draws back soon, too soon. "I must be home," he says ruefully. "Even with my night-walking ways, Sam must be wild with worry for me. But when will I see you again?"

"That I cannot say." Many of the reasons are far grimmer than Halbarad would ever wish to have shadow these blue eyes. "But think of me when you walk beneath the stars, and one night when I may I will answer your thought."

"See that you do." Another smile, another kiss, and when Halbarad strokes his pointed ear he pushes into the caress; then he steps off Halbarad's lap, draws his own cloak about him, and is gone with a wave and a call. "Farewell and be safe, Halbarad the Ranger!"

Halbarad waves in return. "Farewell and be happy, Frodo of the Shire!" Then he rises, stretches and buckles on his swordbelt, looking up as the fading mist allows sunlight to shimmer through the leaves. This snug, shining little world is his to defend for another day, and Halbarad thinks of the task ahead, and the night just past, and smiles.


End file.
